Hello all. Just upgraded to a much larger tank and need any feedback you can give me. I got a 150 gallon, and I want to run it featuring a black arowana. As far as tankmates go, I am looking into a tigrinus catfish, as well as a south american red-tail cat. Along with these I will also be adding my currently 8" senegal bichir, and hopefully either a delhezi bichir or an endli. I'm not quite sure whther I want to get more bichirs though, or add a couple smaller fw stingrays instead. Anyways, I will be running eheim canister filtration because they are all very messy fish. Just not sure about the compatability of all of them. I haven't heard about any of the above fish clashing as far as compatability goes, but let me know what you think. Anyway I shake it though, the black aro, the tigrinus, and the senegal are all going to be in there. Just don't know which others to add.....


Any Input is Helpful!

-Steve

I'll remove both of the south american catfish. They will like to turn the small bichir into food. I've seen many pics of RTC swallowing aros.

yeah definitely skip the red tail catfish. it'll definitely turn your small bichirs (senegal, delhezi if you decide to get one) into food. even without the bichirs, your tank will not hold the RTC for too long.

as for tigrinus, i'm a bit wary too, although i don't know what their temperament is like or how much they like to swallow smaller tankmates. But senegal will only get to 10"-12" max in aquariums, and your 8" is at a point where its growth is quite slow, so its definitely a risky combo down the road. large bichir species like endli would be ok.

an endli would also work fine with the black aro.

i know many stingrays will get too large for a 150. i'm not sure what are some of the smallest though. maybe do a search in the stingray forum and see if this questions has come up before. if not, feel free to post your question there.

if the black aro and tigrinus are going in the tank for sure, i probably would not put the senegal in there, but instead if you want a bichir, add a large species like endli.

Soft skin catfish such as triginus and rtc are not a good tank mates for rays. I used to have a rtc and it was robbing, probably it was iching. It accendentaly robbed its skin to the barb of my motoro stingray. In about two hours it died.Also if your planning to buy a stingray, never buy a skinny and small stingray under 5".

all of the fish that you mentioned, aside from the Senegal, will need a much larger tank relatively soon. Just making sure you knew that you will need to upgrade in the near future.

that tank couldn't hold the aro, rtc, or tig for life... not even close with the catfishes.

i dont' even know if it could hold a full grown endli...

150 is a big tank... but compared to those fish it isn't. you have to see some of these fish at full size to really get a grasp on how much room they need.

either lower your expectations, or get a bigger tank

I appreciate all of the feedback everyone has given me on this! The two catfish are definitely not going in the tank now. Yes, I did already realize that this tank will not suit the arowana for life, but it will eventualy be going into a 1500 gal custom aquarium, so i'm not too worried about the aro. For now though, the cats would be too much of a danger to keep with him and the bichirs for that matter. I definitely want a delhezi bichir to go in there with the senegal. So, besides those three maybe a datnoid or two for a mid-level swimmer? Let me know what you guys think might be good. I do realize that this is not a permanent fixture for the life of these fish, however the black aro and the senegal are both around eight inches, so they still have quite a bit of growing to do.

-Steve

The dats sound good to me.

Datnoids would be nice addition to the aro. I got a 10" sene anf 14" del with my 23" black aro and the doesn't bother them.

If you're looking into Datnoids, Bichirs as tankmates you can also add some Ripsaw catfish, they look menacing but are very gentle monsters.

Yeah, as stated already pretty much everything would end us as an expensive meal for your Red Tailed Catfish, and then he would quickly outgrow the tank in about a year to a year and a half depending on how big he was when you got him. As for Tigs, the are relatively peaceful fish that will eat smaller mouth sized fish. They grow beautiful long streamers that some other fish sometimes find irresistible as they might appear like worms when waving in the current. They are good tank mates with Stingrays and Arowanas and Dats, and make for quite the show piece when full grown.